Lazy, rainy Sunday

Rand and I are sitting here watching women’s gymnastics. I’m having a hard time understanding this new scoring system…although I think they just explained it in a way that makes sense. Sort of.  😉

We saw our parents yesterday…they both came to Buffalo to visit, and we went out for lunch. We had a very nice day. My parents brought a CD with wedding photos, and I started working on uploading them to flickr. I still have *lots* more.

We also got a couple of CDs in the mail from Debbie, and I haven’t even begun to look at them yet. 🙂

Last night, Rand and I went to see Pineapple Express. It was funny. Extremely violent, but funny. 😉

Ok, enough for me…G’night!

Quick update

I’ve been a busy (and productive!) girl this weekend. In addition to weddingstuff, I went to a party Friday night, sent the Toasted Cheese newsletter, finished watching season 3 of MASH, had lunch with Rand’s parents, sold a Mother’s Day calligraphy piece on etsy (woohoo!) and prepared it for mailing (I, um, had to make it too, as I didn’t actually have any in stock. I gave them all away last year).

I also got a haircut (but not really, because my stylist didn’t think I needed a cut. He shaped up the back a bit, as it was looking bushy, and didn’t charge me), bought some new shoes.

Other shopping adventures included picking up an external hard drive (I’m running low on drive space), buying a superclearance desk at Office Max for $30, which will get picked up when my parents come to visit in two weeks. (It’s the floor model, so it’s all put together…)

Oh, and laundry. Always laundry.

I’ve been lax with computer-related stuff this weekend, so if you’ve emailed me, played Scrabble with me on Facebook, twittered at me, or anything else, I will get around to it. Soon.

Have a great week!

Happy Monday

I had a busy weekend and thus a lot to report on…but I’m feeling kinda blah right now. 😛

Quick version: Friday night, went to see Ookla’s bass player play with a cover band in North Tonawanda. Missed the first Buffalo Tweetup, but hope to make it to the next one!

Saturday, went to Club W to see our friend’s girlfriend compete in some sort of talent competition. From what we saw, she should have cleaned it up. She’s a singer-songwriter, and she rocks. Socialized at Pano’s afterwards.

Sunday, attended the “ladies who blog” brunch arranged by Jen. It was a lovely time. Hung out with Jen for a bit afterward, which was also nice…we don’t do that nearly enough! 🙂

Oh, and on Saturday, the two new pens I ordered arrived! I have pictures, and I’ll write a whole post about them soon. 😉

Happy St. Paddy’s Day!

Are you wearing green? I am!

Working today. I’ve been having trouble with my blog since wordpress got upgraded–specifically, accessing my blog using Internet Explorer on the computers at work. I could log in, but I couldn’t *do* anything. I solved the problem today by downloading the portable version of Firefox for my USB key. Looks good so far! 🙂

I had a nice mellow weekend at home. I got all domestic, making chocolate chip cookies on Saturday and meatballs on Sunday. I also did laundry, read a bit, watched some TV, and didn’t spend a whole lot of time online. I did play on facebook here and there (I have two ongoing Scrabble games–feel free to grab me if you want to play!) as well as some other stuff.

I had a fun day teaching math at the middle school on Friday. The 7th graders celebrated Pi Day by decorating digits of Pi to hang on the wall, playing games, and eating pie that they brought in! (Yes, I ate a piece, but only one!) I can’t believe they paid me for that. 😉

And that’s the news on this end. Hope you’re all having a happy St. Pat’s! Enjoy some of my favorite irish-esque music, eh? (I might add some videos when I get home and can access YouTube.)

Jackdaw

Great Big Sea

Carbon Leaf

Weekend wrap-up

The weekend was fun, mellow and relaxing. Here are some of the highlights…

Spend Friday afternoon with a couple of Rand’s friends up from Houghton. We ate lunch at the Village Grille (best. hummus. ever.) and went to see Be Kind Rewind. I liked the movie. It was very funny, and also very touching.

Later, Rand and I watched The Darjeeling Limited, which Rand had just bought. It was as quirky as you would expect, coming from Wes Anderson, but enjoyable. I don’t think it was as good as Rushmore or The Royal Tenenbaums, but I liked it.

Saturday…breakfast and discussion of weddingstuff. Then grocery shopping. We also watched Once, which we’ve had sitting around from Netflix, oh, forever. I liked it a lot. We immediately purchased the soundtrack. (One note, though…could not stop crying. Seriously. I cried for about ten minutes after the movie was over.)

Sunday, we went out and played at Bed, Bath, and Beyond, looking for items we want to include on our registry.

Other things we watched over the weekend…a couple of episodes of Freaks and Geeks, a couple of episodes of Sex and the City (in watching the early episodes, I remember that I was a Carrie-Big fan. It was later that I jumped ship.) I’m probably forgetting something, but oh well.

And as always, the weekend went by too quickly, and I am at work. Happy Monday!

Busy

I h ave a million things to blog…okay, a million is probably an exaggeration, but still.

I took a bunch of pictures over the weekend that I have yet to upload. Soon.

Visiting with the family was good. It was my grandpa’s birthday, and so we had a little family get-together. My aunt and cousin who live in Maryland were there, so it was great to see them.

Of course, I left some things behind…a hairbrush, and a book that I was reading. Feh.

Also slightly annoying…I had been hoping my wedding dress would arrive before the weekend so that I could go and try it on. Alas, the bridal shop called me *yesterday* to tell me that my dress had come in. (You can read about my ongoing shoe quest over at my wedding blog, should you care about that sort of thing…) Rand and I have been plugging away at the wedding details, which I will write about in more detail over there.

We stayed up to watch the Oscars Sunday night, and I wasn’t as bored as I thought I would be. I may go into more detail, but here are the highlights (as far as I’m concerned):

  • The musical numbers. Loved all of them. I haven’t seen any of the movies that had songs nominated (Enchanted, August Rush, Once), but I want to see them all!
  • Jon Stewart bringing the woman who won for Once back onstage to give her acceptance speech since she was so rudely played off. Awesome.
  • Diablo Cody! Whoo! She made me cry.
  • Jennifer Garner being the picture of grace and style. She looked so adorably excited when Diablo Cody won.
  • The cute French girl winning best actress.
  • Ratatouille winning best animated feature.

Hmm…there’s probably more, but I’ve already forgotten. Sadly, I forgot all about joining Eden’s Oscar group and making picks this year. I tried to log in and do it at 8 on Sunday, but I was denied. Denied! Ah well.

Worked yesterday, and am working today. Work is good, but I’m so tired. Want sleep.

And now, I must prepare for a room full of 6th graders. Later!

Brr…chilly weekend wrap-up

Greetings on this exceedingly chilly Monday. This is the kind of day that I wish I could stay cuddled up all warm in the blankets drinking warm drinks and reading. But alas, I have to BS my way through social studies notes instead. (note to social studies teachers–I don’t know anything about feudal Japan. I’m happy to put the notes up on the overhead for them to copy, but don’t expect me to be able to, y’know, talk about it.)

On the other hand, getting paid is always nice. 😉

The weekend was low-key but interesting. Rand and I checked out two houses. We made an appointment to see one on Saturday that seemed perfect on paper. Fireplace, hardwood floors, central air, full basement and attic, three bedrooms plus an office. Everything about the house was quite nice, except for the bedrooms…they were tiny. Seriously tiny. Like, “I don’t know how we’d fit a bed AND furniture into this” tiny. It was nice, but we were sort of a little glad we weren’t totally in love with the place. Right now, we’re kind of at the “looking, but not 100% sure it’s for real” stage.

On Sunday, we called about a townhouse we’d seen up the street from us. I spoke to the realtor as he was on his way to the place for an open house. Well, that worked out well! So we popped over to take a look. It also has a fireplace but is all carpeted. It also has no basement, which is not ideal…but the place is nice. It’s bright and spacious with lots of closet space. Are we serious? I don’t know…interested enough to do some more talking about it and find out if it would be possible.

Otherwise? Had a nice dinner out with friends on Friday. Went to Wegmans to talk about flowers on Saturday…they’ll be emailing me a quote, but their prices seem quite reasonable.

And that’s it for me. How’s your Monday? 🙂

Weekend wrap-up

Bullet-point version

  • Finished season 2 of How I Met Your Mother 
  • Tasted potential wedding cake
  • Laundry
  • Dinner with John @ Pizza Plant
  • Stopped at Best Buy and Barnes & Noble
  • Saw There Will be Blood (my insta-review=meh. ask me if you want more)
  • Lazy Sunday (including a nap)

MY weekend extended into today. Nothing much to talk about there. 😉

Weekend wrap-up?

The farther away I get from the weekend, the sillier it seems to write up a full report…and yet, I do feel like I need to elaborate on a couple of things.

First, the singing.

Certain people (ahem…) have been bugging me to sing for quite a while. Last year, I sang just a bit with my good friend Jam. We sang together, it was late, and there weren’t very many people around. Yet, it was a step. A baby step, but a step nonetheless.

Last weekend, Rand had his guitar out in the hotel room. He recently learned some Flaming Lips songs and was playing some of them. While he was playing Fight Test, I was kind of quietly singing along while doing other things. He stopped and said, “do you want to sing the chorus?”

“Um, you mean in front of people?”

“Sure, why not,” he said.

So he started over, and we ran it a couple of times, mainly working on the timing. He told me I had to project more. So we did it a few more times, and I did my best to project more.

We ended up bringing it out Saturday night, and it went fine. I projected. I hit the right notes. I got the timing right. And ohmygod, I sang…while not entirely alone, I did sing the chorus all by my little lonesome, with people watching. The floor did not open and swallow me up or anything!

Several people have asked if/when I will sing again, and I think it’s safe to say that it will happen again. 😉

The other big excitement of the weekend, for me, was this:

richfantasylivesjpg
(Photo by Debbie Ridpath Ohi)

At every filk convention, there is a Saturday night auction. People donate items, and the money goes toward bringing guests to other conventions…travel expenses and such. This year, I decided to donate a piece of calligraphy. The lyrics are from the song “Rich Fantasy Lives” by Rob Balder and Tom Smith, which was named “Best Filk Song” at the 2007 Pegasus Awards. Both Rob and Tom were at GAFilk, so I was able to have both of them sign the piece.

My piece was the last item auctioned off, and it ended up bringing in $300!

Winning bid

I do sell my calligraphy in my etsy shop. I’m happy to discuss commissions with anyone interested.

The rest of my photos can be found here. I’m off for now, but maybe I’ll get around to the rest of it someday!

Weekend wrap-up (short version)

A longer version with photos will appear…well, sometime. 😉 Photos have been dumped from my camera to the computer, but have not made it online just yet.

The short version is this…busy weekend. Lots of fun. Very tired. Back to work.

Speaking of work, I’m down to my last two weeks as a full-timer. Very strange.

Coupla quick highlights:

  • Meeting Jeff and Maya Bonhoff. They are excellent people.
  • Singing. OMG, yes, I did.
  • Getting my photo taken with Peter S. Beagle, author of (among other things) The Last Unicorn.
  • Yoga
  • Dancing
  • Many hugs and friendly faces.

And I have work to do, so that’ll be it for now. More when I get the photos uploaded. Happy Monday!